K-9s

(The scene: Manhattan's annual Westminster dog show last week, shortly before the judging for best-in-show.) A brass band blared, the Dog Writers Association (just what it sounds like) stopped pecking at their typewriters, and 24 shepherds, Dalmatians and Doberman Pinschers paraded around the arena of Madison Square Garden. They were no prize pooches but hard-working war dogs recruited by Dogs for Defense, Inc., for whose benefit this year's Westminster show was staged.

Dogs for Defense was founded just after Pearl Harbor by a handful of dog fanciers. Well aware of the dog's great value to armies of other nations, DFD rounded up dogs suitable for training as messenger, sentry and pack dogs, offered them free to the U.S. Army. After six months, the War Department at last recognized the dog, made Dogs for Defense its sole and official procurement agency.

Today Dogs for Defense supplies the Army, Navy, Marines and Coast Guard with 800 to 1,200 rookies a month. The Army has four K-9 training camps with 1,000 dog trainers, and the U.S. K-9 Corps has a nickname ("Wags") as well as a marching song (the K-9 Corps) written by Dog Editor Arthur Roland of the New York Sun.* Though the exact duties of U.S. war dogs are a military secret, Army spokesmen agree that one sentry and one dog are worth from four to eight sentries.

To become a Wag, a dog must be a pure-bred or crossbred weighing at least 50 lb., between one and five years old, at least 20 inches tall at the shoulder, physically and temperamentally sound. Among the dogs already enlisted are Violinist Jascha Heifetz' great Dane, Information Pleaser Franklin P. Adams' collie, Author Hendrik Van Loon's Newfoundland.

To relieve DFD's volunteers of their financial burden, a unique fund-raising campaign was launched last week. Brain child of Patent Broker James M. Austin, who has donated some $10,000 to war charities in the name of his famed fox terrier, Ch. Nornay Saddler, the War Dog Fund hopes to enlist as many of the nation's 20,000,000 dogs as possible into an honorary K-9 Home Guard. For $1, a contributor's dog receives the rank of private or seaman, and so on upwards. Some Park Avenue generals or admirals ($100) may go so far as to have gold braid sewed on their strolling jackets, but officially each Home Guard K-9 of whatever rank receives the same insignia: a paw print on a celluloid collar-tag. Among the hundreds of generals is Mrs. Peter H. B. Frelinghuysen's miniature poodle, Ch. Fitter Patter of Pipers-croft, who outshone all her rivals at last week's Westminster.

* Verse:

From the kennels of the country,

From the homes and firesides too,

We have joined the canine army,

Our nation's work to do;

We serve with men in battle,

And scout thru jungles dense;

We are proud to be enlisted

In the cause of The Dogs For Defense.

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